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#1 Posted : 04 February 2008 21:27:00(UTC)
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Posted By Colin Horne Hi All I am a (non-chartered) safety advisor for a UK wide charity and have been asked to help a small local charity with their risk assessments in a voluntary capacity. The local charity has no paid staff and only a small number of volunteers. Would future liability from my voluntary work be indemnified by their insurance - do I need to check? I am aware that the charity I work for has professional volunteers that carry out a wide range of work including health and safety and so long as they are competent and do not act in a grossly negligent way they are covered by the organisation's insurance. Would the same apply to a much smaller charity? Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks Colin
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#2 Posted : 05 February 2008 08:53:00(UTC)
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Posted By Bryan Goldsmith 16052 Colin, Firstly I would ask 'have you been asked to do this by the 'charity' you are employed by as a paid employee? - if so I assume that their employers liability insurance would cover you but whether you would require extra professional indemnity to cover your work is another question. I would make an assessment of the risk in terms of liability to myself before committing and get peer review of the work you do before submitting. Is this 'small local charity' mainly fund raising, running activities or a'shop? For charities I am involved in as a 'volunteer' I am usually bombarded with dictat from the full time paid employees of the organisation and sometimes this seems well over the top distracting resources and commitment of the volunteers from the core aspects of the organisation. There is a thread on these forums about setting up a voluntary sector specialist group. Hope this helps Bryan
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#3 Posted : 05 February 2008 09:39:00(UTC)
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Posted By Tabs I am not an insurance expert, but I would suggest you speak to the insurance broker of both organisations, because I don't think you would have indemnity. Having said that, I think the personal exposure is likely to be small, unless the smaller charity is doing some dangerous and odd things...
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